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slave traders should be avoided if you can to be honest, i am sure there's a few competent ones out there but most of them are so terrible that it defies understanding. they dont give a rats arse about if you fit the job or not, they just want you to sign on so they get their recruitment fee, and if you walk away 6 months later ? hey, repeat business!

When you’re sitting across the desk at a job interview, the focus is squarely on you. For some people, this can be an uncomfortable situation. But it’s where narcissists shine most, and a new study from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln shows how behaviour that might be obnoxious in most places succeeds in interviews.

The study put 72 participants with varying degrees of narcissism but similar skills into simulated job interviews with expert interviewers, and then had 222 raters evaluate their taped performance. The study found that more raters consistently favoured relentless self-promoters over anyone trying to appear humble.

“This is one setting where it’s OK to say nice things about yourself and there are no ramifications. In fact, it’s expected,” said study co-author Peter Harms, according to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. “Simply put, those who are comfortable doing this tend to do much better than those who aren’t.”

For those of us without diagnosed narcissism, there’s still advice to be taken from this study. In job interviews, the rules of normal social interaction get shifted, and people looking to get hired need to view what might be odious behaviour in the rest of life as beneficial.

Most interestingly, narcissists and non-narcissists alike were able to start off self-promoting. But the narcissists really got the edge when the interviewers started to challenge their assertion – non-narcissists tended to back off into tactical modesty, but narcissists stuck to their guns, and it paid off.

“This shows that what is getting [narcissists] the win is the delivery,” Mr. Harms said. “These results show just how hard it is to effectively interview, and how fallible we can be when making interview judgments. We don’t necessarily want to hire narcissists, but might end up doing so because they come off as being self-confident and capable.”

For employers, learning to recognize some of these traits can be important as well – narcissists can be charming, but also disruptive and harmful to actual work. Unless the work is being charming.

When you’re sitting across the desk at a job interview, the focus is squarely on you. For some people, this can be an uncomfortable situation. But it’s where narcissists shine most, and a new study from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln shows how behaviour that might be obnoxious in most places succeeds in interviews.

The study put 72 participants with varying degrees of narcissism but similar skills into simulated job interviews with expert interviewers, and then had 222 raters evaluate their taped performance. The study found that more raters consistently favoured relentless self-promoters over anyone trying to appear humble.

“This is one setting where it’s OK to say nice things about yourself and there are no ramifications. In fact, it’s expected,” said study co-author Peter Harms, according to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. “Simply put, those who are comfortable doing this tend to do much better than those who aren’t.”

For those of us without diagnosed narcissism, there’s still advice to be taken from this study. In job interviews, the rules of normal social interaction get shifted, and people looking to get hired need to view what might be odious behaviour in the rest of life as beneficial.

Most interestingly, narcissists and non-narcissists alike were able to start off self-promoting. But the narcissists really got the edge when the interviewers started to challenge their assertion – non-narcissists tended to back off into tactical modesty, but narcissists stuck to their guns, and it paid off.

“This shows that what is getting [narcissists] the win is the delivery,” Mr. Harms said. “These results show just how hard it is to effectively interview, and how fallible we can be when making interview judgments. We don’t necessarily want to hire narcissists, but might end up doing so because they come off as being self-confident and capable.”

For employers, learning to recognize some of these traits can be important as well – narcissists can be charming, but also disruptive and harmful to actual work. Unless the work is being charming.

I'm totally amazing at job interviews, and I'm not a narcissist. Am I?

I hate sending CVs, though, but that's not a problem at the moment because there's a ton of job offers on my university's website and all I have to do is click on "apply". My online profile (basically CV 2.0, it's pretty awesome) then becomes visible for said company and I get an email if they want to interview me.

Anyways. I'm seriously considering quitting current shit job at the end of my lease and moving home, if I don't pick up a related job to my degree, and doing the unpaid intern thing or a part time job that gives xp and shit $.

Also without the tight budget I'm on now my odds of getting the 2-3 certifications I want might actually happen. I've been trying to save up since last November but things keep taking priority like bills and rent.

On the whole weakness question thing, you know the question is coming so if you can answer it well you're demonstrating a sense of self-perception. If you can further elaborate on your weakness and pivot to how you mitigate the impact it has then thats pretty impressive. Everyone has weaknesses so you just have to remember that you're not really putting yourself at a disadvantage (unless you talk about how you take 30min breaks to masturbate at work...)

On the whole weakness question thing, you know the question is coming so if you can answer it well you're demonstrating a sense of self-perception. If you can further elaborate on your weakness and pivot to how you mitigate the impact it has then thats pretty impressive. Everyone has weaknesses so you just have to remember that you're not really putting yourself at a disadvantage (unless you talk about how you take 30min breaks to masturbate at work...)

I have never been actually asked this. Do interviewers actually ask this, always thought it was a joke.

they aren't difficult to get. Just don't be nervous. Friendly and confident walk in to the room are far more important than anything else. Well, and be more or less qualified for it - don't try a lawyer's job without being a lawyer etc.

On the whole weakness question thing, you know the question is coming so if you can answer it well you're demonstrating a sense of self-perception. If you can further elaborate on your weakness and pivot to how you mitigate the impact it has then thats pretty impressive. Everyone has weaknesses so you just have to remember that you're not really putting yourself at a disadvantage (unless you talk about how you take 30min breaks to masturbate at work...)

I have never been actually asked this. Do interviewers actually ask this, always thought it was a joke.

Anyways. I'm seriously considering quitting current shit job at the end of my lease and moving home, if I don't pick up a related job to my degree, and doing the unpaid intern thing or a part time job that gives xp and shit $.

Also without the tight budget I'm on now my odds of getting the 2-3 certifications I want might actually happen. I've been trying to save up since last November but things keep taking priority like bills and rent.

Hey, big ups on paying your own way through uni as much as you can. You also have a fairly good plan B.

I'm not sure about other countries and I'm also not sure how the crisis affects stuff, but here there are very much "starter" jobs - you won't make a lot of money, but they don't expect (a lot of) experience either. Anything you've done that can help you put on your cv, whether it's the shit job you did to pay for uni (hellooooo call centre in my case - "yes, I'm very customer oriented. I used to be a customer service agent"), a volunteer job (which surely demonstrates all sorts of good stuff about you) or extracurricular things in uni. Consultancy firms like Accenture really need entrylevel people: they don't get paid much the first 2-4 years and earn a lot of the money that goes towards paying the senior consultants. If you're good at what you do (and I have no reason to assume you aren't) you'll make headway within the company fast. Consultancy type firms don't always need the "regular" fields of study either - they'll take a sociologist or historian, as long as you are fucking smart

EDIT - Anybody got any experience with employment agencies? Especially if I'm looking for a career change and am not especially certain what I want to do?

i've worked for a few in the past before i got a permanent contract. recruitment agencies are probably one notch above estate agents in terms of abject fucking laziness and lying in order to profit, they'll usually interview you, ask you what kind of area you'd like to work in, and then proceed to ignore everything you've said whilst offering you anything that turns up just to get the finder's fee or whatever it is.

you can't rely on a steady income, and expect to be lied to repeatedly by the agency about how long you'll be employed for and how much you'll be paid, as they will tell you one thing in order to get you to sign up to a job, then threaten to not offer you more jobs or take you off the books if you say you can't do the job any more after doing it for a couple of days.

once you start a job, make sure the company you've been sent to know exactly what you're capable of - i got sent to a michelin-starred restaurant after the agency had told the owner i was a trained mainline chef, the reality was i had spent the last summer making salads for a chef & brewer pub. obviously the owner was massively pissed off that he had been ripped off, and mainly took it out on me for the few weeks he put up with me. i couldn't leave as i needed the money and needed the agency to offer me more jobs, so just had to put up with it.

on the plus side, you get a chance to show a company what you can do without the pressure of an interview, meet people, identify upcoming vacancies before they get pushed onto recruitment sites etc. i got offered a permanent job (albeit with the civil service) from an agency job, so it was worth it in the end.

just to caveat the tl;dr above, these are obviously your shitty high street agencies (reed, right4staff, manpower etc) and i was a 20 year old with no experience or qualifications, so if you turn up with more to offer then you will almost certainly get more out of it.